A number of endoscopic medical and surgical instruments are available for aspirating fluid during a minimally invasive laparoscopic surgical procedure. One such endoscopic instrument is an aspiration needle for puncturing and aspirating fluid from, for example, an ovarian cyst. Another endoscopic instrument is an aspiration tube for aspirating fluid from the peritoneal cavity. One problem with the aspiration needle is that fluid leaks from around the shaft of the needle when the it punctures the cyst. Likewise, an aspiration tube allows fluid draining into the peritoneal cavity to come in contact with healthy tissue before and during removal. The problem of fluid leaking or draining into the peritoneal cavity is particularly heightened when the fluid contains malignant cells. The leakage of fluid with malignant cells to surrounding tissue significantly changes the morbidity and prognosis of the patient.
When a protein marker test produces a positive result indicating that an ovarian cyst is malignant, an invasive procedure is typically employed to remove the ovary and fallopian tube associated with the malignant cyst. As a result, the patient experiences a four to five day hospital stay with three to six weeks of post-operative recovery.
When the protein marker test produces a negative result indicating that the ovarian cyst may be benign, a minimally invasive, endoscopic close-chambered ovarian cyst removal technique is preferred. This minimally invasive procedure permits the patient to be discharged from the hospital within a 24 hour period with a normal post-operative recovery period lasting from three to five days. Typically, the patient is back to work or performing normal activity within five to eight days of this procedure. However, a negative protein marker test result is accurate only about 80% of the time. Consequently, the surgeon wants to prevent fluid leakage from the cyst. Should the ovarian cyst contain fluid having malignant cells, the morbidity and prognosis of the patient is significantly changed when the fluid is allowed to leak and come in contact with other healthy tissue within the peritoneal cavity. As a result, the morbidity and prognosis of the patient is typically worse than that of the invasive procedure where the malignant cells can be contained from further migration.
The prevention of fluid leakage to healthy tissue during endoscopic aspiration will not effect the morbidity or prognosis of the patient even though the fluid contains malignant cells. A pathological report of the aspirated fluid indicating that malignant cells are present would then indicate the need for the invasive surgical procedure where healthy tissue exposure to the malignant fluid is eliminated or contained. However, leakage of the malignant fluid during the minimally invasive procedure would significantly worsen the morbidity or prognosis of the patient even though the invasive procedure would be subsequently employed.